As I read here about God’s comfort, I think Paul also says that because God comforts us in our suffering, we learn to trust Him. If you look back over your life and conclude that in the midst of a horrible situation, you knew that God was there upholding you and strengthening you, then you also know that you can trust God now. You can say, “God is faithful, and He remains so because He is the same yesterday, today, and forever. He has comforted me in the past, and He will comfort me now.” This is when you begin to grow, and you begin to learn to give the same kind of testimony that Job gave. That is what a Christian needs to do, and Paul knew that in a personal way.
Only about one hundred years before the apostle Paul, Cicero, the great Roman statesman and orator, lost his beloved daughter, Tullia. She was the chief delight of his heart, and she died at a young age. Cicero was absolutely broken by the loss. He had a friend whose name was Servius Sulpicius, who did what any good friend would do. He wrote a letter to Cicero and tried to comfort him. In that letter Servius tried to remind Cicero that suffering and death are the common lot of humanity. He went on to remind Cicero that Tullia had died at a period of Roman history where the republic itself was failing. In the long run, it might be good that she did not live to see the disillusion of the empire.
When you read Servius’ letter you recognize that here is a friend, learned in all the wisdom of the ancients, who is trying to do the best he can for someone he knows well. And yet, there is not much comfort there. At the best there is understanding and sympathy, but not comfort. Now contrast that with what Paul himself does when he writes to the Thessalonians. They had lost friends, but what Paul does there is speak about that time when the Thessalonians are going to see them again. He writes to them that the Lord is going to descend from heaven with a shout, and we are going to be changed and see one another again. And then at the end he tells the mourning church to encourage one another with these words about the return of the Lord Jesus Christ (1 Thess. 4:18).
You see what I mean when I say that God is the God of all comfort and that the experience of that comfort through suffering teaches us to trust Him and gives us the ability to comfort others. Paul knows perfectly well that life is filled with troubles. He experienced more than most people. Who of us can match the sort of list that Paul talks about in 2 Corinthians 11, where he runs down one great tragedy after another? But Paul also knows that there is great comfort because God is sovereign in all of it. In the end good triumphs over evil. Sin will be punished, and all that is endured for Christ’s sake in righteousness will be rewarded at that last day.
For those hearing this who may not be Christians, think of what you are missing. You may be in a period of your life when some of these things that I have talked about have not yet happened to you, but they will. It does not make any difference how healthy you are—some day you are going to get sick. Nor does it matter how young you might be—some day you are going to get old. Eventually, in spite of your health and youth now, you are going to die. And the time will also come when those close to you will be taken away. You are going to go through these things. The question is, how are you going to go through them? Are you going to go through them without the comfort that comes from God? Or are you going to go through them with the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles? I commend to you the Christian way. I commend to you the Lord Jesus Christ, who endured all of this so that He might bring many sons into glory, including you, if you will come to Him.
